From: Orionworks - Steven Vincent Johnson
Jones, please correct me if I've misinterpreted your
premise, but it's my understanding that you are speculating that the BLP
"SunCell" process is based primarily on a Ti - plus- O oxidation process
that Mills doesn't want potential financial backers catch on to, at least
not right away.
Steven - That's not it. There is oxidation, yes and with water supplying the
oxygen, and he is not hiding that. How could he? But there is more.
The only question is this: does the energetic oxidation of catalyst
(titanium or an ensemble of catalysts) also cause hydrogen released from
water to "fractionalize" by dropping into reduced orbitals. Skeptics say no,
but on this point there is good evidence that Mills does see substantial
gain. I am in his camp on the gain part. But is it net gain, and is it cost
efficient?
Granted, it may be naive of me to say this but I'm not at
present inclined to conjecture that Mills is operating on such level of
deceit. Hopefully, I'll be proven right, but I have no guarantee of that.
To be clear, the deceit if there is any - is not related to the oxidation.
It is related to the net cost of a system which demands that an expensive
catalyst be reused, over and over. He scarcely addresses this issue of
rejuvenating the catalyst.
As you have pointed out, how much additional energy would
the recycling of the oxidation process consume? If this is what is really
going on the net energy gain is indeed likely to be distinctively negative.
Yes, that is the problem. If there is deceit, it is in the recycling issue
and it most a question of active avoidance of a key issue, instead of
dishonesty.
[snip] Mills response was that all BLP needs to do is "burn"
off the free oxygen by systematically re-introducing free hydrogen into the
gas mixture and then igniting it. [Snip] POV1: From Jones' conjecture,
oxidation is the primary form of energy being released here. As such, when
the entire recycling process is taken into consideration there is no net
energy gain.
That is not exactly correct. I believe that oxidation supplies a part of the
net energy and that fractionalization of hydrogen orbitals provides most of
the net energy. So there is a bona fide anomaly and possibly a strong one.
But ... the bad news ... even with strong gain, it could be insufficient to
fully rejuvenate the catalyst - especially if "nano" is required, resulting
in the situation where make-up catalyst will be required - or otherwise
making the system unrealistic commercially - for all except military and
NASA.
For some exotic uses (weaponization or rocketry) - a "once through" system
at high cost is not a problem. If the gain is 10x over normal rocket fuel,
then there would be a huge market for a once-though propellant.
Will the military aspects of the SunCell carry the project?
I think the answer is yes, but that leaves most of Mills supporters out in
the cold insofar as it will not solve the energy crisis in its present
design. The would hate it because most of them are idealists who detest the
military.
Therefore, as it looks now to this long-time observer - as soon as the
present round of financing is complete (is it the 8th or 9th round?) then
Mills/BLP will drop the SunCell, without further mention, hopefully after
selling the rights to LM for another big chunk of funds - and move onto
something better.
Unfortunately for this long range plan, within the same time frame, Cherokee
will have its factory in China churning out millions of HotCats for the
masses. :-)
Ironically - given the Mills demo, the CHC or China-Hot-Cat could possibly
employ photoelectric conversion of heat to electricity, but in the IR range.
You heard it first on Vortex.
Jones
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